18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A nice resource for those who like to use romaji, and those who do not., October 15, 2005
I am now living in Japan, and am fluent in Japanese(among other languages), a holder of a degree in linguistics, and a professional language teacher, and tutor of Japanese. I think that this text is a great place to start your japanese studies, whether or not you prefer to use only Romaji, or authentic Japanese scripts (or a combination of the two, like myself.) This feature is what sets this book apart from similar priced texts like Hugo's and Teach Yourself, or the Berlitz Essential Japanese books.
Having succeded in learning in Japanese, I think people who 'demonize' romaji as a crutch, or useless are seriously misguided. Understanding new grammar rules, and sentence patterns can be mastered much faster, and with more confidence if the student isnt concerned about reading new characters correctly as well. Also, I dare anyone to look at japanese only text and not be a little intimidated. I think romaji is important for providing the beginner with the sense of achievement that is so often needed to overcome the inevitable frustrations that come with learning a new language. Viewed in this context it can be a valuable tool.
That said, even if spoken japanese is your only goal, if you plan to live or visit Japan (where japanese is spoken) kanji is a necessity if you realize it or not. It takes a lot of work, and is best started sooner than later.
I like the approach in this book because it presents the option of studying Kanji right from the first chapter, and avoids the common mistake of only teaching kanji individually, out of context like so many other 'kanji' specific texts.
---When helping others study, I often suggest that they work through the first few chapters, working primarily with the romaji grammar transcriptions first, and learning to transcribe them into Katakana* and Hiragana without looking. Once they begin to deal with the basics I have them go back and start to tackle the beginning chapters again without the romaji. This command of the meaning makes working through the japanese scripts less frustrating.
--Another issue I should address here is, that like many reviewers have noted is that vocabulary is not repeated very often within the chapters. I find this to be annoying, but ultimately it is the job of the student to practice, and practice the words on their own.-- if the book provided more chances for the revision of vacabulary, it probably wouldnt cover as much material overall.
The reason I give this book a four is that I find the mixed romaji-japanese script thing to be more annoying than its worth. Also, there are some typos, and that is just lazy editing.
*Katakana has more bang for buck in terms of practicality in Japan--- many foreign words are actually written in Katakana, if you can read it, or write it, its really written that way in Japan.-- Hiragana on the other hand is used for grammatical functions, and small words, while the bulk is written in Kanji--Hiragana is also sometimes used as tiny transcriptions which apear above kanji which tell japanese people how to pronounce them. (only for kids, or rarer Kanji, or odd pronunciations-- most Kanji are NOT accompanied by hiragana transcriptions) Its better than nothing to write gakusei, in hiragana, and kind of 'cute' for japanese friends, but when you read something real, its in Kanji. Which is why katakana is just more useful in the real world.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very good, August 12, 2004
As opposed to another reveiw I'm past the 5th chapter and I've yet to find more than one instance where the vocabluary wasn't comprehensive. Then the word was still available in the glossery in back. In the forward the author does say that in later chapters they will deliberatly not include a comprehensive vocabulary because part of learning the language is learning to utilize the appropriate reference materials. But I haven't reached that point yet. Though, even then, the glossary in the back is comprehensive.
There are however a number of typos throughout. Most are rather obvious because they are nearly all in the vocabulary sections where romaji and kana are in parallel text. Thus, the romaji will nearly always be correct and kana characters will either be missing or misplaced. I'm sticking with a 5 though because I find these typos obvious and they didn't confuse me.
The rest of the book is great. I've found each chapter leads into the next very well with comprhensibile explanations and each section just the right size. Kana and Kanji are introduced from the beginning slowly and reinforced each chapter.
Unfortunatly, it makes everything so comprehensible that many will press on before fully learning each chapter. So I recomend going back to the beginning and reviewing everything at least once every other day until the book is complete. I'm doing this and every time I see some detail I missed all the other times. So it may feel tedious but it does pay off. Also, It's a good idea to keep each study period under 30 minutes so you don't burn out. Review, review, review.
My favorite feature about this book is it is not a "japanese for business" book. If your interest in learning japanese is more for leisure purposes then this is a really good self study course. It is also one of the very few courses that teaches Kanji from day one. So it is at least in the top 3 courses for those who feel learning to read japanese is a high priority.
My only real gripe is the CD is sold separatly. It isn't in any of the bookstores I go to, so I must order it.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very well designed course, August 31, 2004
This book is fantastic, I love the way it eases you into the different scripts and the realistic dialogs in each chapter. Unlike some other books it's also easy to follow and learn from. It teaches you some very usefull sentence structures right off the bat and then eases you into different grammatical concepts.
Of course Anyone using this book would find having a japanese dictionary, grammer reference and kanji dictionary very helpfull to fill in any gaps that pop up. (I really like the Oxford starter japanese dictionary, Oxford Japanese grammer & verbs and Kodansha Kanji learner's dictionary). This book does a way better job than my $100 university text and 2 other self study guides I have had the misfortune of wasting my money on but there are still a few topics that could use more in depth explainations.
I've had a year of formal Japanese instruction in university so I didn't have any problems grasping the early dialogs. Allthough It doesn't look like the author intends complete beginners to understand every word since there are some fairly advanced grammer in them. I guess some people will find this an interesting prelude and others will find it annoying. I personally liked it because it kept things interesting.
The only real complaint I have is there are quite a few obvious spelling errors throughout the book, hopefully they get corrected in a future edition.
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